Ironic
by Azurite
Summary: Isn't life ironic? Especially in Nerima, where strange seems to make a permanent nest. What's so ironic about Ranma and Akane's lives though?


Ironic  
A Ranma 1/2 Fanfiction  
By Azurite  
sailor_andromida@yahoo.com  
http://www.geocities.com/azurite_moon  
Email me, and do it at the end of this fic...   
because there may not be a tomorrow to   
do it then! ^.~  
Lyrics are from Alanis Morisette's "Ironic".   
As if I had her wit, genuius, or money. Or  
her cool hair.   
Ranma 1/2 and all related characters are property  
of Rumiko Takahashi, Viz, Shounen Sunday, Kitty,   
Fuji, etc. Not mine-- this IS non-profit, you know.   
This idea, however, is mine. So ask before redistributing,  
though it's pretty obvious I'd never turn down an archive  
request-- unless it's on some super-hentai site. *gag*  
I got this idea while listening to this song all too many   
times at Tahoe last Labor Day Weekend (09032001)  
-Azurite   
-----------------------------------------------------------  
An old man turned ninety-eight  
He won the lottery and died the next day  
  
It was the kind of thing that was expected in Nerima. Residents learned to expect such events; they dismissed loud yellings, people flying   
across the wards, and people that changed from human to animal. It was  
all commonplace. This was Japan, after all.   
  
It's a black fly in your Chardonnay  
It's a death row pardon two minutes too late  
  
Some people managed to get through it all just fine. The martial   
artists and newcomers, mostly. But there were people in Nerima who  
weren't adept martial artists, cursed, or demi-gods.   
Old women, grandfathers who were sick, young people with diabetes and  
cancer. Lost souls styck on drugs, addicted to smoking. Lost in a   
world of technology and flashing lights... ignorant of the world of  
Ranma and his friends -and enemies, and family- until it hit them   
in the face.   
  
Isn't it ironic... don't you think  
  
After all they had been through-- in real life, suffering and hurting.   
Pain not caused by curses, or too many fiancees. These people around  
the Tendo dojo, the Ucchan, the Nekohanten... they all led normal  
lives, and were impacted with the force of a cannonball when Ranma  
and Co. entered their lives. Therefore, it was ironic the way things  
ended how they did.   
  
Same for those within the Ranma crew. Such normal lives they had led   
before Ranma. How much they had changed. How much their world had   
changed... how much they had suffered...  
  
It's like rain on your wedding day  
  
For Akane Tendo, the part of her life that was missing -the reality-   
was realized on her wedding day. That one, fateful day when everything  
came together-- and exploded in a horrendous mess. Ranma lost his cure,  
and everything was back to the way it had been before-- with Akane's  
unsure, twisted heart, and all the fiancees still after Ranma.   
  
  
It's a free ride when you've already paid  
  
For Ranma Saotome, it was everything. How ironic that with a tear and  
a simple wish, he could go back and change everything-- but he   
couldn't. Couldn't, wouldn't... the words were interchangable to him  
now. How could he just go back and prevent his father from making that  
promise, from taking him to Jusenkyo, or to the Tendos... to meet   
Akane? There was no way he could repay the kindness of the Tendos,   
nor prevent the sad things that had already befallen them because  
of him.   
  
It's the good advice that you just didn't take  
  
For Ryoga Hibiki, it was that suggestion-- just a thought, she had   
said. The one who had spoken to him way back in junior high, before  
he chased Ranma off on that insane trek... her name was... Michika  
Koiyo. A very beautiful girl, bold and bright. She hadn't ever teased  
Ryoga because of his directionless-ness, and instead helped him  
when Ranma wasn't there. Had helped him before Ranma even came.   
She had said, the day before he left to chase after Ranma, that  
maybe he should stay. Why bother chasing after someone over bread?  
But he hadn't listened. Now he was in this mess. Ryoga wished he  
had Michika to help him now. He wondered... where was she?   
  
  
Who would've thought... it figures  
  
Each person in Nerima-- enemy, friend, or relative to Ranma Saotome  
had such experiences. Even those not related in any manner to Ranma  
and his Wrecking Crew had such experiences. It was life.  
  
Mr. Play It Safe was afraid to fly  
  
Soun Tendo was a very different person than what he had been years  
ago. Years ago, he had been young, agile, and with a strong  
sense of purpose and direction. True, he had been the gullible  
master of a perverted and midget-sized grandfather, but he was  
living the life he had dreamt of. Owning a dojo, having three  
beautiful girls... and then... Kimiko had...  
  
He packed his suitcase and kissed his kids good-bye  
  
The one day he decided to take a chance-- take up a friend on  
his offer of a weekend-long trek into the countryside, challenging  
dojos and brushing up on training... that was when he had kissed  
his wife goodbye for the last time. Kasumi was only 9 at the time.   
Nabiki, 7, and little Akane, only 6.   
  
He waited his whole damn life to take that flight  
  
Kimiko had insisted that he go. Told him that he passed up on too  
many chances to spread the name of the dojo, and his chances to  
travel, like he'd always wanted. Told him that the pains were   
nothing, they would go away...  
  
And as the plane crashed down he thought  
  
As he trained, however, with his friend in the mountains, he felt  
a certain unease set in. He had politely asked his friend if  
it was alright if they went back home. His friend had agreed  
readily, sensing that Soun's spirit wasn't in their fights. But  
no amount of training could have prepared Soun for what awaited him  
at home.   
  
"Well, isn't this nice."   
  
Ambulances surrounding the house, crowds of people, and above all,  
the sobs of his two eldest daughters. Working his way through the  
madness, he discovered what had happened-- saw his wife lying pale  
and lifeless on a stretcher, paramedics slowly removing their   
equipment from her limp form. Another paramedic slowly pulling a  
blanket over the dead's form.   
  
And isn't it ironic ... don't you think  
  
It still hurt to think of her. For Soun, as well as Kasumi, Akane,   
and Nabiki. They all hid their hurt in different ways, showed their  
anger and pain in different ways, and lived life to the best of  
their abilities. But they would have been very different people  
had Kimiko Tendo not passed on when she did.  
  
It's like rain on your wedding day  
  
Ukyo Kuonji still believed that the Saotomes owed her something.   
She wasn't always sure what-- after all, she'd spent all her life  
perfecting her okinomiyaki and martial arts techniques. She'd  
goven up her life as a girl because she was bent on revenge.   
But all it took was Ranma calling her cute, and then... ten years  
disappeared like so much dust. Wasn't that ironic?  
  
It's the free ride but you already paid  
  
Mu Tsu, or Mousse, as he was better known to the residents of Nerima,   
wanted to go home. Even though home meant being more oppressed than  
here, where only Xian Pu and Khu Lon were the representatives of  
the Amazon tribe. But it was the principle. Before, he would have said,  
regardless of homesickness, possible cures, or battles with Saotome,   
I need to stay with Xian Pu. I love her, and that is all that matters.  
But the romance was one-sided. Mousse missed his friends from the  
Hidden Arts school. Mousse missed the quiet tranquillity of China,  
that little niche in the Bayankala mountains where the village was.   
But he was already here. That was all.   
  
It's the good advice that you just didn't take  
  
Xian Pu hadn't listened to her great-grandmother before giving the   
strange girl that Kiss of Death. Hadn't told her great-grandmother  
that no, Ranma had not *really* defeated her in honorable combat   
as a boy. If she'd only listened, maybe she'd be home, instead of  
getting ogled at by perverted teenage boys every day. Laughed at   
because of her bad Japanese, or ignored by the only person who  
could secure her future in the matrilineal lines of the tribe.   
  
Who would've thought... it figures  
  
It was ironic. So much had happened. Not all of it revolved around  
Ranma, they supposed, but they certainly linked back to him--   
or at least centered on him in one way or the other. If he were  
to be simply *plucked* from the picture, how different would  
their lives be? How different would they have been, if he had  
never met them at all?  
  
Well life has a funny way of sneaking up on you  
  
She held her limp form in his arms. The maelstrome whipping around  
her created a dull roar in Ranma's ears that made the redhead wonder   
if she was going deaf. The thought came to her slowly-- that Akane  
was not breathing. Regardless of the fact that the latter teenage  
girl was completely nude after having her body's wate restored to her,  
she wasn't breathing. That was when all the battles, all the martial  
arts... just stopped having meaning.   
  
When you think everything's okay and everything's going right  
  
It would have just been fine if those damned Phoenix people hadn't gone  
and tried to dry up Jusenkyo. Would have been fine if Plum hadn't run  
to Japan, if Ranma hadn't saved her, or if Akane hadn't gotten   
kidnapped. Even if all that had happened anyway, maybe the heartache   
that came after Akane's "death" could have been avoided. Somehow.   
  
And life has a funny way of helping you out when  
  
Life had a funny way of twisting things when it came to Ranma. Many   
times, he thought the Gods had a personal grudge against him. Who  
was it that had cursed the Saotomes to live in interesting times?   
Perhaps it was an angry god. It was certainly plausible enough, Ranma  
frequently thought. After all, why else would he have been dumb enough  
to deny his love for Akane, when that simple statement could have   
brought him the peace, the cure... the love he had been longing for  
his entire life?   
  
You think everything's gone wrong and everthing blows up   
  
He'd been knocked out the moment he'd gotten home, and awoken in   
a snow-white tuxedo. He had not recieved any kind of explanation  
from his babbling father, so he had run to Akane-- only to find  
her -willingly- in a wedding dress. The confusion and pain had started  
then. Guilt, hurt, disbelief... they had all piled up at once, and  
led him to say things he didn't mean, and find out his cure was at  
stake. That she had given up the rest of her life and freedom to   
help him. Then everything went sour.   
  
In your face  
  
It wasn't enough for him that he had told her he didn't love her--  
or hadn't SAID that he loved her. Same thing. To Akane, it meant  
that all they had been through was a farce, and he really was just  
a perverted freeloader that had fooled his way into the hearts of  
Akane's family, friends, and rivals.   
  
A traffic jam when you're already late  
  
"Anything that can happen will happen." Ranma had heard it in Miss  
Hinako's English class, and believed it wholeheartedly. Maybe those  
gaijin guys had something right in those heads of theirs. Of course,  
with Ranma, the adage was more like: "Everything goes wrong all at  
once." It was true, every day of his life. Maybe it was exciting, but  
there was only so much one guy could take.  
  
A no-smoking sign on your cigarette break  
  
Every chance he had at a cure, there was someone else after him. Each  
time he tried to get out of the fiancee mess, he got hit by someone,  
or flung into the sky. Every time... he tried to tell her how he felt,   
someone interupted, or he shoved his whole damn leg in his mouth.   
  
It's like 10,000 spoons when all you need is a knife  
  
All he needed was the right time and place. The Gods had given him  
so many chances, but as far as Ranma could see, none of them were  
just right. That one time when he could tell Akane... tell her that  
he loved her. That he wanted to protect her not because he thought  
she was weak, but because he loved her more than anything else.   
But he couldn't tell her... not when it wasn't the right time.   
  
It's meeting the man of my dreams  
  
Kodachi Kuno wasn't one to believe in love at first sight. In fact,   
before she'd met Ranma, everyone had called her "The St. Herebeke  
Cynic." She believed that men were evil, disgusting creatures,   
and most believed this was based on her brother. After all, Kodachi  
went to an all girl's school, spending as much time as she could there.  
Without a mother or female role model, it was suspected as much.   
Meeting Ranma had thrown off Kodachi's entire world. She didn't know  
why she started acting the way she did, but... there had just been  
something in his eyes...  
  
And then meeting his beautiful wife  
  
But she wasn't blind, unlike her foolish brother. She saw that Ranma   
cared far too much for Akane, and no amount of battles won or lost  
would change his heart. He cared for Ukyo too, as a friend, and maybe  
even Shampoo, as a fellow warrior. But her? No, Ranma didn't care for   
her. In fact, Kodachi thought sadly, he probably hated her. It was  
an epiphany to suddenly realize how poorly she had acted and   
represented her family name, and how, like every other teenager, she   
needed to have that one heart-shaking, yet memorable experience. That  
unrequited love...  
  
And isn't it ironic... don't you think  
  
Everyone knew it was ironic. But there was nothing to be done about  
it. Their minds, their thoughts... they were all their own, and that  
was all. No one else knew...   
  
A little too ironic.. and yeah I really do think...  
  
But all it took for someone else to know was an exchanged glance,  
a sad smile, or a tearful grin. Silent expressions, and then,   
everyone knew all.   
  
It's like rain on your wedding day  
It's the free ride but you already paid  
It's the good advice that you just didn't take  
Who would've thought... it figures  
  
Bad things happened-- to the seemingly invincibles of the  
Nerima Wrecking Crew, to the people around them, and   
even the people who simply were bystanders and witnesses  
to the madness of their lives.   
  
People were born, and people died. It was the cycle of   
life, happing in and around the people of Nerima.   
What seemed like uncanny fiction was fact, and no  
one was exempt from the laws of life.   
  
Well life has a funny way of sneaking up on you  
  
"Expect the unexpected." It was a paradox to most, but  
those ones with old and wise eyes beyond their years   
knew. Those that had still-fresh wounds within their  
souls, and those who watched over those in the Tendo  
dojo knew. They knew from experience. Life had snuck  
up on them, slapped them on the back, and told them  
to make their own destiny with what little they  
had left.   
  
And life has a funny way of helping you out  
  
Likewise, odd things happened that ended up working out.  
Not significant things that led to weddings or cures,  
but events just smoothed out in the end. Things were  
a bit better, and feelings could be better read than  
before.   
  
Helping you out  
  
Unexpected people helped, realized, understood. They  
became in the web of exaggerated life that was Ranma's.   
Whether or not they had wished it upon themselves,  
it was now their life, their fate, and their destiny.  
They were upon an open road with many trails, and   
a blackness beyond that dared to be traversed.  
  
And the people set off into this darkness, foraging   
and making their own trails, writing their own  
destiny where no one else could. The nuisiances  
of Nerima became guides, companions, and dear friends.   
Life was like that. It was ironic.   
------------------------------------------------------  
OWARI  
-----  
That was weird. But the song really inspired me,   
especially the line "rain on your wedding day". It  
kinda fit. I'm sure someone else could do something  
else with the story, maybe even better, but I had  
to get this out of my system.  
Many thanks for reading this-- now email me before  
it's too late: azurite_moon@yahoo.com  
or better yet: sailor_andromida@yahoo.com  
Arigatou gozaimashita in advance!  
  
Azurite 09042001   
  
  
  



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